A girl in a loving relationship with Paris, with two best friends and a father figure she found in Pigalle, leads a perfectly designed life, in her Gare du Nord apartment, wonderful job and a lot of coffee. After some irritating, peace-wrecking things happen, her life is suddenly chaotic, and as if that’s not enough, she finds herself batting her eye-lashes at a man she didn’t even notice before. Right before she has a fight with him, and right after her best friend stops speaking to her for something that isn’t her fault. And then, there’s the risk of losing the apartment. And not knowing what to do next.

Escaping yourself is hard. As hard as being a person who squirms at cheesy romance stuff, at the same time living in the city people paint and write poetry about. The question is, are you supposed to keep running, or just be an adult about it?

I started reading Coffee, Cigarettes and Crisis not really knowing what to expect but hoping for some fun chick-lit to brighten up my day. It was very witty from the start although it took me a little while to actually know what was going on. But once I got through that stage, I really loved it.

It possibly isn’t the most unpredictable plot in the world but it was such a fun book. It’s funny, light-hearted and very entertaining. The protagonist finds herself in a crisis, or what is considered a quarter-life crisis – she’s lost her job, found herself with feelings for the wrong person and is left with no sense of direction in her life. In what could be a straightforward book on finding yourself, the main character instead finds herself in some ridiculous situations, a lot self-inflicted, and she was the perfect character to read – humorous, easy to root for and laugh with (at).

There was a lot to like about this great chick-lit – the humour, the Paris setting, the likeable main character but what I loved the most were the supporting characters. Max, Edith, Cesar, and Hugo are just a few names in this fab cast. They were all really amusing characters and livened up the story a lot. They were all mad too but this just made the book more entertaining. I love reading books where you just wish you knew the characters in real life – the friends and not just the love interest – and this book was ideal for that reason. They were the kind of characters I just knew that if they were real life people, life would never get dull.

Coffee, Cigarettes and Crisis was a quick book which took me a day out in the sun to get through and I couldn’t have thought of many better ways to spend the day. It was light-hearted reading which had me laughing and smiling and cringing at times but it was just the kind of feel-good book I was hoping for.